Nearing the 2024 election, news websites and channels have been flooded with stories about each next big thing that happens in the race for an elected seat. With so much new or recycled information, it can be hard to dissect what really matters on Election Day.
Political science professor Timothy Lynch gave a presentation to St. Thomas students on Oct. 9 called “Election 2024: What Will, Might and Probably Won’t Matter for U.S. Election Outcomes,” in which he discussed a framework for following along and understanding the 2024 campaign.
“Even if you’re not interested in the election, you probably can’t avoid it at this point, right?” Lynch said. “We’re at that time, the election cycle, the campaign cycle, where it is everywhere, all the time.”
Lynch discussed the idea of “game-changers vs. game-samers” based on ideas from “The Gamble,” a book written by political scientists Lynn Vavreck and John M. Sides during the 2012 presidential election.
A “game-changer” is “an event that happens during a presidential election contest or during a campaign that fundamentally alters the landscape,” Lynch said. He said that a “game-samer” recognizes that “these events happen, but they don’t fundamentally change what’s actually happening in the election.”
The main idea from the book, Lynch said, is that the term “game-changer” is often overused.
“In order for something to be a game-changer, it has to move peoples’ positions,” Lynch said.
Big conversations this election cycle have been about former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden’s debate, the assassination attempt on Trump, Project 2025 and Trump’s felony charges.
And although these seem initially like “game-changers,” Lynch said that their impact tends to quickly fade from the newsstream. They do not change the polls, and people are most likely going to stick with the candidate from the party they already align themselves with.
One of the biggest headlines surrounding the election in the last few months was Biden halting his bid for reelection and endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris.
Before Biden dropped out of the race, he was trailing in the polls by a few points. But then, Harris’ nomination did affect the polls.
“If there’s any game-changers in this election, this is it,” Lynch said.
“All of a sudden, we saw once Democrats were coalescing around Vice President Harris, the polls started to change a little bit,” Lynch said, “The Democratic candidate became more competitive, maybe even eclipsing the Republican candidate in many of the national polls that exist.”
So why don’t headlines change the game for voters and move them out of their partisanship?
Lynch said that debates usually happen too far into the electoral process, after people already know their candidate. “Game-changers” happen earlier, around the primaries.
When learning about the “game-changers” that hit the news each day leading up to the election, Lynch recommends bringing a broader perspective to the news people consume.
“There might be a larger story to tell,” Lynch said, “Pay less attention to the headlines, pay more attention to the reasons why the candidates are doing what they’re doing. Because there are reasons.”
Elaina Mankowski can be reached at mank2823@stthomas.edu.